"I do not claim any harm to the one or two kids who noticed a five-pixel breast on their TV screens for a period of under 1 second."
"My main objection, as I've stated in another reply, was that our current regulatory and cultural environment conditioned me not to expect a strip show in the middle of the superbowl."
I'm not sure I understand, was there actually a strip show during the superbowl or just a tiny glimpse of a breast for a fraction of a second ?
If it was indeed a strip show then it should certainly have been advertised as such but if it was just a very quick flash of a single breast which was over in a second then I can't see any problem with that and I see no need to specifically advertise that beforehand.
Despite what you say it does seem rather like you are trying to impose your moral views on other people by requesting that such minor things are made such a big fuss of.
"The rest of you have had a couple millennia to shape the world into something you could feel safe with and you didn't do it."
Actually I think most people in the UK and probably elsewhere did feel very safe in the world until the recent actions of the US screwed all that up. The US seems to us to be spiralling into some kind of paranoid psychotic delusion which given the number of WMD's it possesses does not seem very comforting.
You also may want to take into account that a lot of the rest of us of do indeed have a hundreds and hundreds of years of experience in running large parts of the world and that we have collectively learnt a lot from that experience.
I've got nothing against Europe as a place, I like holidaying there etc but I wouldn't say that it was better the UK in many areas other than a nice climate and a better attitude to work/life balance. The UK works a lot better as a country than many European countries who are a lot less organised and efficient than the UK in many areas.
In general though I just can't see any benefit at all in being governed as part of a much larger entity, it's seems fairly clear to me that what we really need is more local government which we can access and influence easily as citizens and not some beaureaucratic monstrosity trying to balance the requirements for a vast area of Europe.
As a trading organisation the EU is great but I really do not want it to go any further than it has already towards governing the UK.
So when Mr Blair was telling us about all those WMD which could be launched against us in 45 mins and how he was certain, and how history would vindicate him, that Iraq did have WMD he somehow wasn't lying ?
The current Labour government is a joke, they have no actual beliefs or morals to guide their policies other than the belief that they need to do whatever they can to get elected again and that moral concerns should not get in the way of this aim.
I agree, I was just importing comments from the previous ( identical ) thread and it is surprising that anyone modded me up for that.
Observant moderators would have noticed the title of my post and the disclaimer at the bottom.
In a way I was performing a small public service, this debate had already taken place in the earlier "Sun lose to Kodak" story posted just before this one so I was just collating the best of the previous posters to save people bothering here.
"Kodak praised the verdict and said it was part of an aggressive push to convert innovations ? both homegrown and purchased ? into real money. The company over the past several years has been issuing licenses, filing lawsuits, forming spinoff companies and finding other uses for its technologies."
It seems that today, companies don't produce products, they produce lawsuits, and that's how they get their money. How long can this continue?
Furthermore, since 1.06B is about 1/3 of Sun's cash on hand (here [yahoo.com]), what will that mean for Sun? It's 7% of their total value, so this can't be good for them.
In the end, it's only the lawyers who win.
--
First the Eolas lawsuit, now this. What is going to take for Bill Gates to wake up and say that suing OpenOffice developers isn't worth being able to lose $1.06B to a company that actually has the legal resources to wage a protracted war with Microsoft? If Sun loses this, the Microsoft had better be willing to settle in a very generous was or Kodak will go after them. $1.06B for Sun, since Microsoft has much, much more money it could just as easily be $5B from Microsoft.
This is all starting to become like nuclear weapons in and after the cold war. First it seemed like no big deal, hell it was even a requirement to be a big player to have nukes. Now all these little players are getting them, and Eolas and Kodak IMO are no different or better than the rogue states getting their own arsenals of nukes. Now the big boys are getting attacked so, what do they do? Disarm by pushing for the elimination of all software and business method patents, to keep these guys from having legal nukes to use against them, or do they just pray that not enough ankle biters will get enough patents to bankrupt them in independent and coordinated lawsuits?
--
Although I know its offical/. policy that everyone should run around in circles yelling its the end of the world everytime a software patent is infringed, this particular dispute is far from over and probably faces 5+ years of appeals before any money changes hands or any technology is changed or restricted.
First, after damages are decided, Sun will move with JNOV (asking the judge to set aside the verdict because there was insufficent evidence to support to verdict). There is probably a 10% probability of this happening in any given case, even more when there is alot of money at risk.
Second, Sun will appeal to the Federal Circuit, which usually overturnes 60% of district court decisions because district courts usually dont know anything about technology and know even less about patent law.
So, IMHO, its too early to start running around in circles over this decision, at least until the Federal Circuit affirms.
Please check the other identical story on./ for the original posters of these insightful and interesting opinions.
Gosh, thanks for clearing that all up for me jgeorge. It's clear I've still got a lot to learn here !
Looking again at the 2 articles I can also see that there are quite a few different words in each of the summaries and although at the end of the day it is the exact same topic for the exact same discussion they do also both contain different links.
I am surely grateful to the/. ( is that how you say it ? ) editors for allowing me to examine this important subject from two distinct viewpoints. Thankyou./ and thankyou editors. Thankyou also whichever moderator it is that moderated my grandparent post as being "Overated" when in fact no one else had rated it anyway, thankyou for taking the time to understand the moderating process and thankyou for choosing my humble post as the object of your sublime moderating attentions.
Nonsense, please provide some evidence for these facts of yours.
Secondly, if you kept your kids locked indoors throughout their entire life you'd find they were probably less likely to be run over by cars, abducted by strangers, exposed to disease, get skin cancer, fall over and graze their knees and all the other normal hazards faced by all creatures, human and animal going about their business in the world.
You simply want to maintain the lifespan of your possesion for as long as you can and maximise your investment in your pet by preventing it from running away or coming into contact with factors which may cause expensive vet bills.
You are not primarily concerned with the well being of your cat, despite loudly protesting that it is your prime concern, you are primarily insulating yourself from the emotional turmoil of you pet injuring it's self, dying or running away from you.
The cat doesn't care if it lives till 3 or 30, they are not known for their advance planning capabilities, and they undeniably do enjoy being outside hunting so why are you taking this away from your pet simply to suit your own petty fears ?
No they're not and you're an idiot. Cats are perfectly capable of making all the catty decisions they need to make to live their catty lives.
Cats are animals not some kind of robotic toy, if people want to let them outside then that's fine because outside is a cats natural environment and cats are excellently equipped to cope in it.
If you don't like cats coming into to your backyard then that's your look out and I advise that you find some other outlet for your mouth frothing madness.
Are you the same anonymous coward replying to all these posts ?
When they are outside cats behave pretty much like wild animals, they are too agile to have any hope of restricting them to one area.
I am curious as to whether or not you and your kids live in some kind of sterile bubble protected from all the harsh realities of real life ?
If dogs can kill cats then that's the cat's look out and I wouldn't come whining to anyone about it but it's going to be a pretty old, stupid cat they will let a dog catch it and kill it. Most dogs I have seen have a healthy respect for cats fairly soon after the first time they try and mess with one.
Get a cover for your sandbox or hermetically seal your garden, all kinds of worms, slugs, birds, spiders, mice, rats etc are crapping and weeing in it constantly anyway.
How is this insightful ? It's just idiotic and given the post it is replying to makes no sense either. Cats may well live just fine indoors but they also live perfectly well outdoors as well.
The parent post was definitely not associating being a responsible owner with mutilating animals, in fact he was saying the exact opposite.
Cats are territorial and predatory hunters, they live off small birds, animals and insects and are perfectly equipped and capable of feeding and looking after themselves by doing just that. If that is not the case why do you think various elements of Australian wildlife are in the process of being decimated by cats hunting and killing it ? And before you misread that and assume I am saying this is a good thing I'm not saying that at all I am simply providing proof that cats are effective hunting animals.
Living in the wild a cat would face the same challenges as other predators / scavengers such as foxes and in the wild animals do die, all the time, but for each one which does die young others don't and continue to live long fruitful lives huntin' and killin'.
You are moaning about other cats coming into your backyard but you have not understood that cats are territorial and this happens because other cats consider your backyard as a part of their territory. The best way to prevent that would be to let your own cat into the yard and let it protect it's territory for you.
How the hell do you "take cats" into the wild ? On a lead or something ? Cats can amuse themselves quite sufficiently in the wild on there own, even if they can't be bothered to do any hunting themselves they are usually adept at roaming the neighbourhood and begging for food from your neighbours.
If you don't want to let your cat outside fine, it's your cat do what you like with it but don't pretend it's for the benefit of the cat and don't bother lecturing everyone to make them do the same as you because you're not very good at it and it's just annoying.
If I hadn't already posted in this topic I would have modded that off-topic, also although I haven't bothered doing anything more than scan through it it appears to be a load of crap, I do hope you just cut and pasted it from somewhere rather than bothering to type it all.
In fact you copied it from here http://www.geocities.com/jim_bowery/tlic.html
I would agree with you entirely ( in fact I do agree with you entirely ) but just add that really is no difference between amateurs and professionals except that professionals are funded to do what they do whereas amateurs are not.
Like you say the true test of quality work is the dedication and motivation of the person rather than anything else.
Obviously I haven't bothered to read the article but I am fairly sure that whatever field you care to mention was built from the work of dedicated amateurs or professionals in one field developing others as a hobby in their spare time.
The designations "amateur" and "professional" are fairly meaningless anyway, do the amateur's ( presumably ) discussed in the article dedicate any less time to their work or are they significantly less intelligent ?
In fact I think the real distinction is purely financial, professionals are funded for the work they do which when things move beyond a stage where normal people can't afford the tools to continue working in it it is obviously going to be dominated by professionals. I suspect the real driver behind this "Amateur revolution" is simply that the tools required are either very cheap or free for use by anyone who wants to use them.
Yes, there was a very interesting documentary by a journalist in Iraq on a few weeks ago on BBC 2 ( I think it was repeat ) who was spending time with the American troops, general population and met some of the insurgents / terrorists.
Some of what he said and filmed was very interesting indeed.
Sadir city for example he explained as being an extremely poor run down area under Saddam which contrary to the hopes of it's inhabitants remained just as poor an area under the Americans, no running water and no sign of anyone doing anything to improve or rebuild it. This area is now used a recruiting ground for the Medhi army where given the situation of the people there is proving very fertile. It is these people who travelled to the Mosque in Najaf ( or where ever it was ) . When they are back home in Sadr city it is a virtual no go zone for Americans.
He was also out on the street during some general demonstrations which became increasingly frightening as he was targetted by the crowd as a westerner and before long had a dozen people surrounding him holding guns and knives and someone shouting at him holding a live grenade and threatening to pull the pin. He was rescued by some local shopkeepers who waded into the crowd with a gun and took him into there shop which they then shut up and told him to sit there and wait it out. The interesting bit is what he said about his rescuers, essentially he let it out he'd met them before but on that occasion it was during an interview he'd obtained with the insurgent forces i.e. the people who rescued him were deeply involved in a lot of the terrorism going on in the area.
The other interesting thing was that a lot of the insurgents he interviewed were fanatically religious but some of the other leaders he intervied showed no sign of religious fanaticism at all and appeared to have a very practical outlook.
I think the overwhelming sense I got from that documentary is that Iraq is not a simple problem, various people are all involved in fighting; Americans, religious groups, 'the resistance' and no one is really involved in actually rebuilding much or improving anything. The Americans can't because they are too busy concentrating on their own security and the Iraqis aren't because they either have no resources or they are too busy planting roadside bombs.
The really worrying thing is the sheer amount of Iraq which is now effectively out of the Americans control and controlled by the resistance or lunatic religious groups. At the end of day the general Iraqi population are happy to be free from Saddam but very unhappy about the destruction of their country and the security situation.
"You don't give your enemy a place to hide and regroup. That's why we went into Afganistan."
Yes, that was obviously a visionary and practically effective policy wasn't it. I do think however that it was undermined somewhat by the subsequent invasion of Iraq.
Cynical types may think that after this excellent corrective measure Afghanistan is now a no go area governed by local warlords fighting for control of the burgeoning heroin trade whilst the on-going situation in Iraq is drawing much larger numbers of impressionable young men into the world of terrorism and intimidation and that the world in general is now much more likely to suffer from terrorist activities.
Even more cynical types might surmise that as the US Government came to terms with 9/11 and realised there was little they could practically do in public to "right the wrong" decided instead to put on a display which everyone could understand with an invasion of Afghanistan involving lot's of precision weaponry, terrorists lurking in caves and illegal combatants during the course of which they realised there was a good chance they'd get away with more the same in Iraq.
Luckily I am not a cynical person. Go USA, Kick That Terrorism To The Kerb !
Because if no one has seen it then there's no evidence it exists.
Also it's not clear from the articles if it is the deepest cave, the measurements seem to be taken from the cave mouth which is up a mountain in a mountain range so I think that there may be other caves which extend deeper into the Earth ( e.g. any caves at the bottom of deep ocean trenchs would certainly be deeper ).
I was quite worried for a while that I just had an "Interesting" mod, even though there isn't a "Scary" moderation I seriously hope nobody does find it interesting, certainly no one with the power to do anything about it.
However this does seem to be the logical conclusion of a lot of the "anti terror" plans being discussed at present.
"I to understand that, if a text message is sent to a bunch of random people telling them to do something stupid, they will go do it"
Absolutely, this is a well known fact within the mobile phone industry, haven't you ever received those e-mails telling you you have won a "free" holiday if you phone a certain number ?
Yes and if you believe the slavering anti facist "protestors" that have been turning up at every festival I have been at this year it will apparently soon to be illegal to state and dissension from the government or to gather in groups of more than 1 without a full on police mounted charge. It will soon be just like "Nazi Germany".
Why can't they all just get a job ? And why are they always selling this information in magazines ? Hippy Scum !
( that last paragraph is not aimed the parent poster this is just a general rant so mod me offtopic or something ).
Outlawing cities is a bit extreme however I agree something needs to be done.
Maybe it would be better to cordon off the areas of the cities where the main terrorist targets are living or working: the business district, famous celebrities, politicians, influential business leaders etc and make sure they are well defended and secure.
The main terrorist suspects could live outside this cordoned off area and maybe be given passes to get into to work as cleaners, shop assistants etc if they conform to sufficiently secure personality profiles.
Terrorism is clearly the biggest and most dangerous threat the world has ever known and it's only by protecting those in power who do there best to protect us all that we can defeat it, that and lot's of bombs - laser guided bombs.
I used to work for the company providing support to Virgin Trains and our main source of humour on the long night shifts was people phoning up to tell us that "RAVERS had gone down" and we needed to do something to "bring the RAVERS up again." Our suggestions of "more ecstasy" didn't always go down well.
This was almost as amusing as the system they have in Virgin music stores called "ELVIS" and we would be similarly amused to hear that "ELVIS had gone down".
Slashdot Mirror
"I do not claim any harm to the one or two kids who noticed a five-pixel breast on their TV screens for a period of under 1 second."
"My main objection, as I've stated in another reply, was that our current regulatory and cultural environment conditioned me not to expect a strip show in the middle of the superbowl."
I'm not sure I understand, was there actually a strip show during the superbowl or just a tiny glimpse of a breast for a fraction of a second ?
If it was indeed a strip show then it should certainly have been advertised as such but if it was just a very quick flash of a single breast which was over in a second then I can't see any problem with that and I see no need to specifically advertise that beforehand.
Despite what you say it does seem rather like you are trying to impose your moral views on other people by requesting that such minor things are made such a big fuss of.
"The rest of you have had a couple millennia to shape the world into something you could feel safe with and you didn't do it."
Actually I think most people in the UK and probably elsewhere did feel very safe in the world until the recent actions of the US screwed all that up. The US seems to us to be spiralling into some kind of paranoid psychotic delusion which given the number of WMD's it possesses does not seem very comforting.
You also may want to take into account that a lot of the rest of us of do indeed have a hundreds and hundreds of years of experience in running large parts of the world and that we have collectively learnt a lot from that experience.
I've got nothing against Europe as a place, I like holidaying there etc but I wouldn't say that it was better the UK in many areas other than a nice climate and a better attitude to work/life balance. The UK works a lot better as a country than many European countries who are a lot less organised and efficient than the UK in many areas.
In general though I just can't see any benefit at all in being governed as part of a much larger entity, it's seems fairly clear to me that what we really need is more local government which we can access and influence easily as citizens and not some beaureaucratic monstrosity trying to balance the requirements for a vast area of Europe.
As a trading organisation the EU is great but I really do not want it to go any further than it has already towards governing the UK.
So when Mr Blair was telling us about all those WMD which could be launched against us in 45 mins and how he was certain, and how history would vindicate him, that Iraq did have WMD he somehow wasn't lying ?
The current Labour government is a joke, they have no actual beliefs or morals to guide their policies other than the belief that they need to do whatever they can to get elected again and that moral concerns should not get in the way of this aim.
I agree, I was just importing comments from the previous ( identical ) thread and it is surprising that anyone modded me up for that.
Observant moderators would have noticed the title of my post and the disclaimer at the bottom.
In a way I was performing a small public service, this debate had already taken place in the earlier "Sun lose to Kodak" story posted just before this one so I was just collating the best of the previous posters to save people bothering here.
"Kodak praised the verdict and said it was part of an aggressive push to convert innovations ? both homegrown and purchased ? into real money. The company over the past several years has been issuing licenses, filing lawsuits, forming spinoff companies and finding other uses for its technologies."
It seems that today, companies don't produce products, they produce lawsuits, and that's how they get their money. How long can this continue?
Furthermore, since 1.06B is about 1/3 of Sun's cash on hand (here [yahoo.com]), what will that mean for Sun? It's 7% of their total value, so this can't be good for them.
In the end, it's only the lawyers who win.
--
First the Eolas lawsuit, now this. What is going to take for Bill Gates to wake up and say that suing OpenOffice developers isn't worth being able to lose $1.06B to a company that actually has the legal resources to wage a protracted war with Microsoft? If Sun loses this, the Microsoft had better be willing to settle in a very generous was or Kodak will go after them. $1.06B for Sun, since Microsoft has much, much more money it could just as easily be $5B from Microsoft.
This is all starting to become like nuclear weapons in and after the cold war. First it seemed like no big deal, hell it was even a requirement to be a big player to have nukes. Now all these little players are getting them, and Eolas and Kodak IMO are no different or better than the rogue states getting their own arsenals of nukes. Now the big boys are getting attacked so, what do they do? Disarm by pushing for the elimination of all software and business method patents, to keep these guys from having legal nukes to use against them, or do they just pray that not enough ankle biters will get enough patents to bankrupt them in independent and coordinated lawsuits?
--
Although I know its offical /. policy that everyone should run around in circles yelling its the end of the world everytime a software patent is infringed, this particular dispute is far from over and probably faces 5+ years of appeals before any money changes hands or any technology is changed or restricted.
First, after damages are decided, Sun will move with JNOV (asking the judge to set aside the verdict because there was insufficent evidence to support to verdict). There is probably a 10% probability of this happening in any given case, even more when there is alot of money at risk.
Second, Sun will appeal to the Federal Circuit, which usually overturnes 60% of district court decisions because district courts usually dont know anything about technology and know even less about patent law.
So, IMHO, its too early to start running around in circles over this decision, at least until the Federal Circuit affirms.
Please check the other identical story onGosh, thanks for clearing that all up for me jgeorge. It's clear I've still got a lot to learn here !
/. ( is that how you say it ? ) editors for allowing me to examine this important subject from two distinct viewpoints. Thankyou ./ and thankyou editors. Thankyou also whichever moderator it is that moderated my grandparent post as being "Overated" when in fact no one else had rated it anyway, thankyou for taking the time to understand the moderating process and thankyou for choosing my humble post as the object of your sublime moderating attentions.
Looking again at the 2 articles I can also see that there are quite a few different words in each of the summaries and although at the end of the day it is the exact same topic for the exact same discussion they do also both contain different links.
I am surely grateful to the
How is this any different from the posting just a few short hours ago about this exact same thing ?
Nonsense, please provide some evidence for these facts of yours.
Secondly, if you kept your kids locked indoors throughout their entire life you'd find they were probably less likely to be run over by cars, abducted by strangers, exposed to disease, get skin cancer, fall over and graze their knees and all the other normal hazards faced by all creatures, human and animal going about their business in the world.
You simply want to maintain the lifespan of your possesion for as long as you can and maximise your investment in your pet by preventing it from running away or coming into contact with factors which may cause expensive vet bills.
You are not primarily concerned with the well being of your cat, despite loudly protesting that it is your prime concern, you are primarily insulating yourself from the emotional turmoil of you pet injuring it's self, dying or running away from you.
The cat doesn't care if it lives till 3 or 30, they are not known for their advance planning capabilities, and they undeniably do enjoy being outside hunting so why are you taking this away from your pet simply to suit your own petty fears ?
No they're not and you're an idiot. Cats are perfectly capable of making all the catty decisions they need to make to live their catty lives. Cats are animals not some kind of robotic toy, if people want to let them outside then that's fine because outside is a cats natural environment and cats are excellently equipped to cope in it. If you don't like cats coming into to your backyard then that's your look out and I advise that you find some other outlet for your mouth frothing madness.
Are you the same anonymous coward replying to all these posts ?
When they are outside cats behave pretty much like wild animals, they are too agile to have any hope of restricting them to one area.
I am curious as to whether or not you and your kids live in some kind of sterile bubble protected from all the harsh realities of real life ?
If dogs can kill cats then that's the cat's look out and I wouldn't come whining to anyone about it but it's going to be a pretty old, stupid cat they will let a dog catch it and kill it. Most dogs I have seen have a healthy respect for cats fairly soon after the first time they try and mess with one.
Get a cover for your sandbox or hermetically seal your garden, all kinds of worms, slugs, birds, spiders, mice, rats etc are crapping and weeing in it constantly anyway.
How is this insightful ? It's just idiotic and given the post it is replying to makes no sense either. Cats may well live just fine indoors but they also live perfectly well outdoors as well.
The parent post was definitely not associating being a responsible owner with mutilating animals, in fact he was saying the exact opposite.
Cats are territorial and predatory hunters, they live off small birds, animals and insects and are perfectly equipped and capable of feeding and looking after themselves by doing just that. If that is not the case why do you think various elements of Australian wildlife are in the process of being decimated by cats hunting and killing it ? And before you misread that and assume I am saying this is a good thing I'm not saying that at all I am simply providing proof that cats are effective hunting animals.
Living in the wild a cat would face the same challenges as other predators / scavengers such as foxes and in the wild animals do die, all the time, but for each one which does die young others don't and continue to live long fruitful lives huntin' and killin'.
You are moaning about other cats coming into your backyard but you have not understood that cats are territorial and this happens because other cats consider your backyard as a part of their territory. The best way to prevent that would be to let your own cat into the yard and let it protect it's territory for you.
How the hell do you "take cats" into the wild ? On a lead or something ? Cats can amuse themselves quite sufficiently in the wild on there own, even if they can't be bothered to do any hunting themselves they are usually adept at roaming the neighbourhood and begging for food from your neighbours.
If you don't want to let your cat outside fine, it's your cat do what you like with it but don't pretend it's for the benefit of the cat and don't bother lecturing everyone to make them do the same as you because you're not very good at it and it's just annoying.
If I hadn't already posted in this topic I would have modded that off-topic, also although I haven't bothered doing anything more than scan through it it appears to be a load of crap, I do hope you just cut and pasted it from somewhere rather than bothering to type it all.
In fact you copied it from here http://www.geocities.com/jim_bowery/tlic.html
I would agree with you entirely ( in fact I do agree with you entirely ) but just add that really is no difference between amateurs and professionals except that professionals are funded to do what they do whereas amateurs are not.
Like you say the true test of quality work is the dedication and motivation of the person rather than anything else.
Obviously I haven't bothered to read the article but I am fairly sure that whatever field you care to mention was built from the work of dedicated amateurs or professionals in one field developing others as a hobby in their spare time.
The designations "amateur" and "professional" are fairly meaningless anyway, do the amateur's ( presumably ) discussed in the article dedicate any less time to their work or are they significantly less intelligent ?
In fact I think the real distinction is purely financial, professionals are funded for the work they do which when things move beyond a stage where normal people can't afford the tools to continue working in it it is obviously going to be dominated by professionals. I suspect the real driver behind this "Amateur revolution" is simply that the tools required are either very cheap or free for use by anyone who wants to use them.
Yes, there was a very interesting documentary by a journalist in Iraq on a few weeks ago on BBC 2 ( I think it was repeat ) who was spending time with the American troops, general population and met some of the insurgents / terrorists.
Some of what he said and filmed was very interesting indeed.
Sadir city for example he explained as being an extremely poor run down area under Saddam which contrary to the hopes of it's inhabitants remained just as poor an area under the Americans, no running water and no sign of anyone doing anything to improve or rebuild it. This area is now used a recruiting ground for the Medhi army where given the situation of the people there is proving very fertile. It is these people who travelled to the Mosque in Najaf ( or where ever it was ) . When they are back home in Sadr city it is a virtual no go zone for Americans.
He was also out on the street during some general demonstrations which became increasingly frightening as he was targetted by the crowd as a westerner and before long had a dozen people surrounding him holding guns and knives and someone shouting at him holding a live grenade and threatening to pull the pin. He was rescued by some local shopkeepers who waded into the crowd with a gun and took him into there shop which they then shut up and told him to sit there and wait it out. The interesting bit is what he said about his rescuers, essentially he let it out he'd met them before but on that occasion it was during an interview he'd obtained with the insurgent forces i.e. the people who rescued him were deeply involved in a lot of the terrorism going on in the area.
The other interesting thing was that a lot of the insurgents he interviewed were fanatically religious but some of the other leaders he intervied showed no sign of religious fanaticism at all and appeared to have a very practical outlook.
I think the overwhelming sense I got from that documentary is that Iraq is not a simple problem, various people are all involved in fighting; Americans, religious groups, 'the resistance' and no one is really involved in actually rebuilding much or improving anything. The Americans can't because they are too busy concentrating on their own security and the Iraqis aren't because they either have no resources or they are too busy planting roadside bombs.
The really worrying thing is the sheer amount of Iraq which is now effectively out of the Americans control and controlled by the resistance or lunatic religious groups. At the end of day the general Iraqi population are happy to be free from Saddam but very unhappy about the destruction of their country and the security situation.
"You don't give your enemy a place to hide and regroup. That's why we went into Afganistan."
Yes, that was obviously a visionary and practically effective policy wasn't it. I do think however that it was undermined somewhat by the subsequent invasion of Iraq.
Cynical types may think that after this excellent corrective measure Afghanistan is now a no go area governed by local warlords fighting for control of the burgeoning heroin trade whilst the on-going situation in Iraq is drawing much larger numbers of impressionable young men into the world of terrorism and intimidation and that the world in general is now much more likely to suffer from terrorist activities.
Even more cynical types might surmise that as the US Government came to terms with 9/11 and realised there was little they could practically do in public to "right the wrong" decided instead to put on a display which everyone could understand with an invasion of Afghanistan involving lot's of precision weaponry, terrorists lurking in caves and illegal combatants during the course of which they realised there was a good chance they'd get away with more the same in Iraq.
Luckily I am not a cynical person. Go USA, Kick That Terrorism To The Kerb !
Because if no one has seen it then there's no evidence it exists.
Also it's not clear from the articles if it is the deepest cave, the measurements seem to be taken from the cave mouth which is up a mountain in a mountain range so I think that there may be other caves which extend deeper into the Earth ( e.g. any caves at the bottom of deep ocean trenchs would certainly be deeper ).
Yes I was looking for a funny mod.
I was quite worried for a while that I just had an "Interesting" mod, even though there isn't a "Scary" moderation I seriously hope nobody does find it interesting, certainly no one with the power to do anything about it.
However this does seem to be the logical conclusion of a lot of the "anti terror" plans being discussed at present.
"I to understand that, if a text message is sent to a bunch of random people telling them to do something stupid, they will go do it"
Absolutely, this is a well known fact within the mobile phone industry, haven't you ever received those e-mails telling you you have won a "free" holiday if you phone a certain number ?
Yes and if you believe the slavering anti facist "protestors" that have been turning up at every festival I have been at this year it will apparently soon to be illegal to state and dissension from the government or to gather in groups of more than 1 without a full on police mounted charge. It will soon be just like "Nazi Germany".
Why can't they all just get a job ? And why are they always selling this information in magazines ? Hippy Scum !
( that last paragraph is not aimed the parent poster this is just a general rant so mod me offtopic or something ).
Outlawing cities is a bit extreme however I agree something needs to be done.
Maybe it would be better to cordon off the areas of the cities where the main terrorist targets are living or working: the business district, famous celebrities, politicians, influential business leaders etc and make sure they are well defended and secure.
The main terrorist suspects could live outside this cordoned off area and maybe be given passes to get into to work as cleaners, shop assistants etc if they conform to sufficiently secure personality profiles.
Terrorism is clearly the biggest and most dangerous threat the world has ever known and it's only by protecting those in power who do there best to protect us all that we can defeat it, that and lot's of bombs - laser guided bombs.
So ideally you'd like to model the criminal justice system in your country on that of Saudi Arabia or North Korea ?
Yeah and British Airways refusing to sell him Concorde was really really annoying. I would have loved to have had him keep it flying.
I used to work for the company providing support to Virgin Trains and our main source of humour on the long night shifts was people phoning up to tell us that "RAVERS had gone down" and we needed to do something to "bring the RAVERS up again." Our suggestions of "more ecstasy" didn't always go down well.
This was almost as amusing as the system they have in Virgin music stores called "ELVIS" and we would be similarly amused to hear that "ELVIS had gone down".